Chapter 30: Burn and Drive
June 25, 20—
6:21 P.M.
The Tudor at 726 Sontenheimer Street was set ablaze that morning, and Pavlov was sure that Alan Nebula’s toasted bones had been found after the inferno was tamped, motionless in a favored recliner where the old man slept and snored. The Snowden Fire Department’s chief of twenty-seven years, Patrick Kinwell, would clarify that a gasoline accelerant was used to start the blaze. No one in Snowden would be fooled by Pavlov’s antagonistic actions. No one at all.
* * * *
He drove west through Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois. He wanted to be in North Dakota by the following day, and the day after that he wanted to land in Canada, crossing the border to safety, a different life and world, where there would be more little boys for him to “play” wit
